A Return to His Roots
by Chaoslover43
Summary: Naruto has grown up and become a powerful shinobi. He's taken on the powers of Haku, Neji, Pein and beaten them all, but what's a powerful shinobi to do but go back to their roots? A short one shot about how a more experienced Naruto runs a simple and childish prank.


"Oh, hello Naruto. Come back to see how your instructors have been doing in the years since you grad-" _thud_. Iruka had been attempting to greet his favorite student as the young adult wandered into the academy training fields, when the student in question pulled an object from behind his back and pelted him in the face _with it_. It moved from its position behind Naruto to impacting his face within a split second, so his best guess as to the identity of the object was a water balloon.

Whatever it was, it struck him across the upper left portion of his forehead, turning his head to that side with the force of the collision. A disturbing, syrupy product was discharged over that side of his face and body, though the vast majority of the substance flew in large globules to spread over the ground and a couple of nearby training posts.

In a bout of rage the instructor flicked a kunai from his pouch at the blonde. Before Iruka could register that throwing deadly weapons at old friends was not usually a good idea, the kunai impacted Naruto and he went up in smoke. "Shadow clone..." Iruka muttered, "I STILL can't believe I let him get away with learning that!"

The crowd of academy students behind him, assigned to the task of practicing the academy method for utilizing the big three throwing weapons of kunai, shuriken, and senbon, began tittering loudly as their teacher dripped what looked to them to be maple syrup all over the practice field.

Iruka turned very slowly back toward his students and, even more excruciatingly slowly, turned a glare that could melt their weapons on each of them. The majority of them gulped audibly and turned back to their chosen dummies, and while not all were cowed none had the temerity to say another word. "Damnable Naruto," Iruka muttered under his breath, as he settled back into his role of teacher. "Ashita, it is a movement that requires finesse, but you have to put more force into it than you are. Work on trying to feel your chakra flowing through you like you're making seals for the kawarimi, and direct it to your arms to enhance the speed of your throw."

All throughout his instruction Iruka had sludge dripping heavily from multiple parts of his body, but no one really wanted to bring it up.

.oOo.

All over the peaceful town of Konoha Naruto's friends, enemies, and a few he'd chosen arbitrarily were the victims of the same exchange. Not all the clones were violently dispersed by the targets, but most were. Naruto had quite the collection of violent acquaintances, and Konoha had quite the collection of violent residents, period.

The real Naruto was sitting atop the Hokage's tower observing the reactions of the targets he could see. He had taken such a long break from pranking that he had forgotten what it was like. The rush that came from knowing you were about to be chased by an irate group of people was incomparable. He thought so at least.

Finally the first target had caught up with his assailent. He was by far the highest level target. An ANBU captain who simply went by 'Tiger' who had watched over Naruto as a child. Naruto had resented the watching when he found out about it from the Hokage after he'd grown up. He was thankful the old man was looking out for him and all, but it was a little off putting to know that a leading member of an elite force of deadly super-assassins was watching over you.

Anyway, his old pal the Tiger had found him. "Naruto," the male voice stated calmly from inside the animal mask, "Why do I have some sort of viscous goop dripping off of my nice, crisp ANBU uniform?"

The man's gray vest was positively oozing brown gunk, while his black over clothes were not faring much better. His posture still seemed somehow relaxed, even though he was perched carefully on one of the white, claw-like appendages the roof of the building sported.

Naruto gave him a fox's smile. "I was bored. This whole ninja thing CAN occasionally get boring," he told the man, forcing his voice to assume an earnest timbre.

Tiger's expression, even behind his mask, was unreadable. "I'm going to have to chase you down and beat you up now, okay?" he told Naruto seriously.

Naruto smirked. "Good luck with that. I did a kawarimi with a clone as soon as you got here," he said, laughing somewhat cruelly as he dissolved into smoke.

No one would ever know if Tiger had realized this. The real Naruto had used a somewhat complex series of eleven kawarimis with strategically placed clones to leave himself at the end of a chain that had stretched from the Hokage tower to a little traveled antiques shop on the edges of Konoha's commercial district. The last clone in the chain had been masquerading as an ancient urn of Fire Country make. Naruto and his clone both used a henge and kawarimi simultaneously to pull off the seamless transition that left the real Naruto ready to hold the ashes of someone's deceased grandparent or some such depressing urn-based behavior.

Outside in Konoha, however, shinobi were flying over Konoha's rooftops searching for a telltale shock of blond hair... Knowing this he chuckled to himself as best an urn could manage. Being king was good.

AN: Heh, just a little something I found that I had written for 750 words a few years back. I cleaned it up a tad and here it is. I hope I may come back to this style of writing some day, but no promises. One shots were always my best work, but incomplete multi-chapter stories are my bread and butter ;)


End file.
